The Curse of the Puritans

General Go Discussion
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Disclaimer: I am, and aspire to remain, an insignificant TPK. I understand if you find it unthinkable, but it’s nobody’s jurisdiction to find it unacceptable.

In my brief time here I have encountered disproportionately many times crusaders of “the proper way”, eager to “set us straight”, mortified that we might “learn the wrong habits”. These people usually turn out to be (based on their games, not their words), invariably:

  • Sandbaggers. They have much more powerful tools at their disposal and know how to use them, why would they care anyway.
  • High and mighty mid-strong players who offer “teaching games” but argue any help tool is “non-canon” so they can demoralize the hatchlings.
  • Poorly assembled overachievers who think nobody wants to be close to their brilliance, when in reality it’s their halitosis (actual or virtual).

Bonus category: “In real life I’m actually 4kyu stronger, I mean in the go club I’ve been playing for years I would probably give at least 3 stones, and I even played in other servers and I didn’t have this problem, but in OGS the ranks are honestly too volatile, and not accurate with all these analysis tools, and probably most people use bots, so… yeah.”

Go is the clearest mirror; if you don’t like your rank, it’s not the other players.

(Note: this is not a direct but rather a cumulative reply. It is what I want to reply collectively to all those kinds of people. Leave others be. Insomnia makes me irritable.)

Inb4: Don’t rush to recognize yourself in this just to feel offended.

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I think you can find sandbaggers on all servers
Treat them as a tool to get better, don’t feel bad just coz you lost to a stronger player, you learn more from them than even/worse players

Anybody giving teaching games have their own style of teaching, so maybe you feel offended during the lesson, but perhaps in reality you should thank them for taking the time to give you a teaching game instead. Sure maybe he was an ass, but you shouldn’t go crazy about it, he did it out to give back to the community for free, even though maybe his attitude was a bit over the board, but I’m sure in his own thoughts he meant better goods for you and the community.

Narcissists exist everywhere, even most people has been nacissistic at one point in life. Don’t tell me you haven’t looked in the mirror and said "Oh boy, look at how sexy he/she is” :sunglasses:
So what about them?

So in conclusion, I believe if you think the world is great, then the world is great.
If you believe the world is filled with bad people, bad thoughts and such, then world is such for you.
It’s all in the mind!
Good luck in life and in GO! Hope you appreciate the world around you instead.

edit
My gym teacher once taught me, “No pain，No gain!”
I believe that is the case for Go or in life as well. Endure the pain, and just look into the results, you’ll find yourself in a wonderful world. If you just only look at the pain and not the gains, then you’re in a world of pain.

edit2
Relooked at the OP(original post) again, originally didn’t look so deep just replied the bullet contents lol.
Sorry, you were offended by those people who were trying to help the community.
You even looked up their games to find them to be sandbaggers, bad teachers, narcissists.
Maybe the actions they took didn’t parallel to the words they gave, but perhaps they are striving to be one, so they put them into words out of good faith, yet games said otherwise because they haven’t changed completely yet.
You are free to share your own opinion and thoughts just like everybody else.
And they just shared theirs which offended you in a way that they contradict what they said.
Life is similar as well, we often see people have 2 different faces, but on the bright side you can only look at their good side, instead of pinpointing their bad stuff. Unless they’ve committed a crime or hurt the world/community/people, where which you can report it.
Stay positive and life becomes wonderful.

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